The Hindu Business Line : TAM Media bid to assess creative strategies of ad campaigns

CREATIVE is going to be the new buzzword at TAM Media Research. The company is shortly going to launch Creative Ad Ex, which is going to be a division of Ad Ex India and would focus on brands' creative strategies.

In fact, it has recently launched an advertising intelligence package, Ad Venture, which provides media schedules along with the creative strategy of the various brand campaigns.

The package includes TV as well as print campaigns, and would enable advertisers and the creative agencies to review their complete advertising strategy by comparing the past campaigns with the present ones.

Ad Ventures, according to Mr Pradeep Hejmadi, Vice-President, TAM Media Research, has created a library of brand campaigns of as many as 50 product categories. Advertisers and creative agencies, he says, can even have access to campaigns done by competition. "They can now look at complete creative strategy of a particular brand and understand how the campaigns had impacted the brand's market shares."

"It also enables the advertiser and the agency to compare a brand's past creative strategy with its sales data," he adds.

Similarly Ad Venture Alerts, says Mr Hejmadi, would help broadcasters benefit from the advantage of knowing on a weekly basis the campaigns that they have lost to competitive channels or gained exclusively in a competitive environment. He says that this advertising intelligence package to a great extent would help bridge the current chasm between the creative and media agencies, which has come to surface due to the unbundling of services. "The package would enable the advertiser to co-ordinate better with its creative and media agencies and would also help the media planner to bring in the creative aspect when he plans the media."

Mr Hejmadi also said the coming months could see customisation of the package as per the needs of the clients. TAM has already bagged three clients for Ad Venture and is quite confident that it would do well. "We have observed the need for a package like this during our various interactions with the industry."

The company has also recently launched a Press Innovation Monitor and a Television Innovation Monitor, which tracks non-standard advertising. "Hindustan Lever Ltd some time back had stuck a Clinic shampoo sachet in a print ad campaign which was quite unconventional. By archiving non-standards, we are trying to get a creative person think beyond standard advertising," says Mr Hejmadi.